Bus tunnel closed into next week

Seattle

The downtown Seattle bus tunnel will remain closed until at least Wednesday because of computer problems and the Christmas holiday.

Contractors and transit officials have replaced some allegedly faulty circuit boards in an electronic system that would control the tunnel's lights, signals, ventilation and elevators in the event of an emergency. Tests of the new parts were going well Friday afternoon, said Sound Transit spokesman Bruce Gray.

This week, the computer-controlled links failed between tunnel stations and an off-site operations base, run by King County Metro Transit.

Eighteen bus routes will continue to run on surface streets instead of in the tunnel. Metro's Christmas Day bus service is on a Sunday schedule, and the tunnel is usually closed on weekends.

Flood victims in King and Snohomish counties have been added to the list of people getting individual assistance after this month's storm and floods.

Gov. Christine Gregoire announced Friday that the Federal Emergency Management Agency has added two counties to the individual disaster declaration.

Residents and businesses in nine counties are now eligible for individual assistance: King, Snohomish, Grays Harbor, Lewis, Mason, Pacific, Thurston, Clallam and Kitsap. They can get housing grants, loans and other help.

Renton

Car hits building; passenger killed

A 26-year-old Renton man died early Friday in a single-car accident, police said.

The deceased was a passenger in the back seat of a 2002 Acura that was traveling northbound on Talbot Road South in Renton. At about 2:15 a.m., the vehicle drove off the road, plummeted down a retaining wall and struck the corner of an apartment building, according to a Renton police news release.

The driver, a 24-year-old man, and another passenger, a 24-year-old Kent woman, were transported to Harborview Medical Center in Seattle for observation.

Nobody in the apartment building was injured, though the building sustained minor structural damage, police said.